the ghost is you
by Calculated Artificiality
Summary: Four times Rayna almost told Deacon, and one time she did.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: The last story I wrote and published here for Rayna & Deacon felt so very much like a goodbye, but I guess it wasn't. And, well, if any two people know about goodbyes that aren't actually goodbye, it's these two._

* * *

Leaves swirl by on an easy breeze, a thick chill in the air. The cold snap came early this year and the leaves changed before they were ready, but an echo of the brilliant colors of autumn still remains in the fallen leaves that crunch underfoot. Children run around the neighborhood laughing, dressed as dragons and princesses, superheroes and villains, hidden by masks and wigs and makeup.

Jack-O-Lanterns line the street and as the sun begins to fall, they flicker to life almost as if by magic. Their grinning faces light up walkways and dot walls, jagged cuts made by tiny hands in anticipation of a holiday punctuated by sugar and becoming someone else, some unrecognizable version of one's self.

Halloween used to be Rayna's favorite – she used to love dressing up, becoming someone else for just a day. But ever since she had Maddie – long before, probably – it's become little more than a reminder. A reminder of a life she wanted to have, but never got.

It's the anniversary of the day Deacon graduated from rehab, the first time, and she can't help but remember every Halloween how she was filled with _hope_ that first one. It wasn't the last time she had hope, but it _was_ the first time and the weight of the memory feels heavy enough to crush her sometimes.

Rayna wraps her thick sweater around her body as she waits at the end of the walkway to a huge house a few houses down from where she settled with someone to try to help her forget the love of her life. She tucks a strand of her long hair behind her ear as her hands move up and down her arms, trying to generate heat.

She didn't dress up this year – things have been moving so quickly for her, she didn't have the time. She'd barely had enough time to scrap together a costume for Maddie.

Rayna's album just released to the top of the charts and critical acclaim, and she's about to kick off a world tour that is already very nearly completely sold out already before it's even begun.

 _The Woman Who Has Everything_ the tabloids call her, and every time she reads a headline like that it cuts some jagged hole in her heart because it should be true, she should want for nothing.

But here she stands on Halloween, the wind whipping around her, at the end of a driveway of neighbors she'll never meet watching the _only thing_ she ever wanted walk up a long walkway lined with bushes covered in fake spiderwebs.

Maddie is dressed like a pumpkin and her costume billows out around her, a green hat-stem perched atop her little head. She's beaming as she has a little pumpkin container already filled nearly to the brim with candy in a stranglehold.

"Mama!" She says, toddling up to Rayna as she thrusts the candy container out at her, "Cany!" she says, smiling – at three, she's still having trouble with some of her letters – the 'D's refusing to form in her small mouth.

"I see that," Rayna smiles, heart bursting in her chest because before Maddie, she didn't realize she could love something – _someone_ – so much.

Maddie sets the bucket on the ground and digs around in the candy, pulling a tiny candy bar out and thrusting it out to Rayna, "Mama!" she shouts, before digging again and pulling out another candy bar, "Eacon!" she sticks her tiny hand out and smiles.

Deacon crouches down and accepts the candy from Maddie, "Thank you, sweetie," he smiles, reaching out and ruffling her hair underneath the stem-hat before he looks down at the candy bar in his hand, "It's my favorite."

It isn't his favorite, not anywhere close. In fact, he hates that particular candy bar. But, Maddie beams at him before turning, picking up her bucket that she refuses to let either Rayna or Deacon carry for her. She reaches her tiny hand out to Rayna, and Rayna reaches down to take it as Deacon steps next to Maddie.

As they amble along to the next house, Maddie excitedly rambling about 'Haween' and 'cany', Deacon quietly unwraps the candy bar and takes a bite. Rayna watches him out of the corner of her eye, and she can't help the smile that spreads across her face at the look on his.

"What?" he asks around the candy bar, face scrunched up as he begins to chew.

"Still hate those, huh?" she smirks at him as he chews and swallows.

"That obvious?"

Rayna laughs, "A little bit, yeah," she shakes her head, still smiling as they come to a stop in front of the next house. Deacon makes a show of swallowing his very least favorite candy bar and Rayna rolls her eyes, "Why eat it, then?"

Deacon shrugs and gives her a lopsided grin – the same one he used to give her that made her stomach tingle, the same one that still does – as he tucks the candy bar wrapper into the pocket of the jeans he's always known how to wear so well. "Maddie gave it to me."

He says it simply, like it's the easiest answer in the world, like he would do anything for the little girl that is not his – except that she is, only he doesn't know that, and she wonders if there will ever come a day where that doesn't break her heart. She knows the answer, knows it will always leave her feeling hollow and scarred – would leave him that way, too, if he knew.

Rayna stares at him, her mouth parted, words she said three years ago to a Deacon who doesn't remember on the tip of her tongue and she thinks maybe she will say them. She will look back on this moment for years and think maybe she would have said them if Maddie hadn't hopped up and down, pieces of candy spilling out of her bucket as she squealed, loudly.

Maybe she would have told them if the moment didn't slip away so quickly.

"Eacon!" she holds out her hand, "Eacon, Eacon!"

Deacon breaks eye contact with Rayna and reaches down to take Maddie's hand, leading her up the drive of the next house on their trick-or-treating route.

Rayna watches them go, watches as Deacon takes slow and tender steps with Maddie, bending down to talk her through a scary prop skeleton that sits in the corner. She imagines what Deacon is saying to her daughter – to _their_ daughter – telling her not to be afraid, telling her it's all just pretend, that what isn't real can't hurt her.

And Rayna thinks it's a good life lesson, even if she knows it isn't true – even if sometimes the things that hurt _most_ are the things that aren't real. Like promises made in a tiny apartment, blankets tucked up around two sated bodies trying to keep warm because they can't pay the heating bill. Whispered words in the dark that twirl and tunnel into the heart of a girl in love for what she knows is the very first and what she will find out is the very last time: _I'm gonna stay sober this time, baby_.

As they come back down the drive – Maddie and _her father_ – Rayna knows it's a pain that keeps giving, the one that comes from things that aren't real.

They go house to house until it's dark and cold and Maddie can scarcely keep her eyes open. After the house at the end of a cul-de-sac, Maddie raises her arms and Deacon bends down to pick her up. He takes her bucket of candy, the first time she's relinquished it all night, and holds it in his hand as Maddie winds her tiny arms around his neck and rests her face against his shoulder.

She's asleep by the time they make their way out of the cul-de-sac.

Rayna reaches out and takes the candy bucket from Deacon, her heart constricting in her chest as she looks at Maddie asleep on his shoulder. Her little legs splay out over either side of his hips and his arms lock around her lower back as she sleeps peacefully, never doubting her safety in Deacon's arms.

Rayna knows the feeling.

Wrenching her gaze away, she reaches into the bucket and pulls out a piece of candy. Deacon watches her, a smile on his face.

"What?" she asks, popping the tiny candy bar into her mouth.

"Still like those Butterfingers, huh?"

Rayna laughs, chewing the candy as she tucks the wrapper into the pocket of her sweater. They've been her favorite for a long time, and she used to refuse to share with Deacon until he'd satisfactorily _convinced_ her that she should.

"Yeah," she smiles against the memories, so she won't cry over them, "Still do."

Rayna wraps her arms around herself, the bucket of candy bouncing against her arm as she walks.

"Cold?"

She shrugs, "A bit."

Deacon looks at her helplessly, Maddie in his arms, and Rayna laughs.

"It's okay," she shakes her head, "I'll survive."

Deacon gives her a small smile, "You always do."

And she does – even things she never thought she would. She survived losing _him_ , and it's _still_ the hardest thing she's ever done.

She clears her throat and sets her jaw, staring straight ahead as they walk quietly down the lane.

"So, Teddy's out of town tonight?"

"Yeah," she nods, stopping momentarily to study a particularly scary jack-o-lantern on a wall, "He's got a… merger… in Dallas."

Deacon stares at her for a long moment, and when she finally looks at him and keeps walking, he bursts into laughter. He tries to keep it quiet to not disturb Maddie as she slumbers and his shoulders shake with the effort. Rayna raises an inquisitive eyebrow at him and he shakes his head.

"You have no idea, do you?"

Rayna narrows her eyes at him, but as his eyes sparkle in the faint glow of the streetlamps on the street, she can't help but laugh, too.

She bites her lip, "I swear, he explains it to me every time, but…"

"It ain't music," Deacon grins at her, changing his grip on Maddie before he keeps walking, falling in step again next to Rayna.

"No," Rayna smiles, her arms still hugging her body to ward off the chill, "It certainly isn't. Anyway," she sighs, still smiling, "It's something like that."

Deacon chuckles and they fall into a comfortable silence as they walk back to Rayna's house. Eventually, they chat about the upcoming tour, her album, the sold-out arenas.

"This is it," Deacon says softly as they round the corner to the block her house is on, "This is everything you've ever dreamed of."

Rayna smiles, but doesn't look at him. She wonders if he can see the hollowness of her smile, if it shows as much as she feels it because _no_. It isn't _everything_ she's ever dreamed of. Everything she's ever dreamed of is standing next to her right now, the perfect picture, the life she wanted to have.

"Yeah," she whispers, swallowing around the lump in her throat and Deacon glances at her.

As they walk up to her house, Rayna wonders if she imagines the guilt that flits across his face in the moonlight. She opens the door as Deacon stands holding Maddie on the threshold and she fishes her camera out of the pocket of her sweater. Setting the candy down inside, she raises the camera and snaps a picture: Deacon, Maddie in his arms, the soft porchlight casting a halo around them.

She will keep it for years, it will sit in an album, a haunting reminder of everything she lost – of how _she_ is haunted.

Maddie shifts on Deacon's shoulder, rubbing her face against his shirt in her sleep. Orange face paint rubs off on his shirt and Rayna gasps.

"Sorry about that," she indicates the stain and Deacon doesn't even look at it.

"It's fine."

"If you want to leave it here, I can wash it for you," she offers, feeling awkward and nervous on her own doorstep.

Deacon smiles, "I can clean up my own messes, Ray."

They both hear the word he doesn't say: _now_.

Because there was a time when he couldn't – when she had to do it for him, and there was a time when the biggest mess he made was _her_. She couldn't stop crying for weeks the first time they'd ended things, and though she'd gotten more practiced at it every time, though she was eventually able to only cry at night tucked into the safety of her bed, she was a different kind of mess every single time.

She _still_ is.

Deacon stares at her for a long moment, his eyes still so blue and so searching – the eyes she fell into when she was just a girl, really.

His eyes leave hers to scan the archway of her house, to take in the grandeur, the extravagance of this big house before they settle back on hers and his gaze pierces her. Sees right through her, the same way it always has; the same way _he_ always has, "Are you happy, Rayna?"

He'd asked her that years ago, in a cabin he bought for her – _her dream house_ – and she had answered truthfully, and without hesitation.

But she doesn't answer it now – she _can't_. He's holding the first and worst lie she will ever tell him in his arms, and she can't lie to him again, not right now. So she just smiles, and then reaches her arms out for her daughter.

She ignores the hole in her heart that tells her that Deacon should be the one to walk Maddie upstairs and tuck her in; that he should be the one to make rules about candy and bedtimes. That he should be the one to make _memories_ , and not just when Rayna's husband is out of town.

"Thank you," her voice is quiet, timid as she wraps her arms around Maddie, trying to ignore the heat of Deacon's chest against her hands.

Maddie whines during the transfer, but quiets down as she snuggles her face into Rayna's shoulder.

Deacon's hands shift back to his pockets, like he doesn't quite know what to do with them without Maddie or Rayna in them. He's looked like that for years now.

"Thanks for letting me tag along tonight," he smiles, his eyes heavy with what looks like regret and memory, "Halloween is hard."

Rayna wonders if he's thinking about his first graduation from rehab. Or if maybe he's thinking about the very beginning of she and him – of the spooky party where he'd kissed her on a wall and defended her honor. She thinks of that night every year, too, trying to tamp down the sadness it wells up within her. She always fails.

"You're welcome any time, Deacon."

Deacon lets out a breath of a laugh because he knows it's a lie – she knows it's a lie too, and she hadn't meant to tell him another one, but like so many things in her life it's much too late now.

But he doesn't blame her. He doesn't call her out on it, he just backs away slowly down her porch and winks at her, the gesture sending a wave of _something_ through her body where it lands in her stomach and tightens there.

"Night, Ray."

"Night."

She closes the door when he turns and walks to his truck and she stands for a moment, Maddie heavy in her arms, until she hears his truck's engine catch and he drives away. She stares at the door for a bit longer, her body weighed down by her past.

As she climbs the stairs of her house, daughter in her arms, only one thought resonates in her mind, taunts her with each step she takes:

 _Rayna Jaymes wants for nothing – except_ everything _._


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: part 2/5._

 _(and as a side note: Many commenting on my older stories have asked me if I still get notifications, and indeed I do - they're sent right to my inbox, and they make me so happy & stir inspiration. Thank you!)_

* * *

It's the hottest day of the year, the sun beating down onto the asphalt, sending it right back into the air in a cycle that feels so very much like Rayna's life these days: inescapable, suffocating, cloying.

With a shake of her head, she parks her brand new SUV outside of the house that has become so familiar to her over the last year and a half and turns around to glance in the back seat where Maddie sits in a booster seat, looking excitedly out the window.

The sight makes Rayna's heart lurch in her chest already, but she pastes on a bright smile anyway, "You ready, sweet girl?"

Maddie turns and beams, nodding her head enthusiastically, "Ready, mama!" She reaches over and unhooks her seatbelt, "I'm gonna play guitar just like Uncle Deacon!"

Rayna swallows and slides her sunglasses on top of her head, trying to figure out for the seventeenth time in three days when exactly her little girl had gotten so big. She says all her letters now, her sweet speech impediment finally gone, and she's been insisting more and more lately that she's a big girl.

"Yes," Rayna agrees, unhooking her own seat belt and opening the car door, "You sure are," she closes the door and takes a steadying breath before she opens the back door, "God help me," she mutters under her breath as she scoops Maddie out of the car and into her arms.

The little girl gets heavier each day, but Rayna still takes every chance she can to hold her, knowing she won't have much longer, knowing that some day will be the last. So even though the sweat slicks her body immediately as she hoists Maddie onto her hip, closing the car door with her elbow, Rayna refuses to put Maddie down until they're standing on Deacon's front porch.

The nerves roil in her stomach as she glances around, heart pounding in her chest – despite how often she comes here now, it somehow never gets any easier, there's always this moment where she's right back where they used to be.

There had been years where she thought she and Deacon would never be in a good place – a _truly_ good place – again. Years where she thought he'd always look at her like she betrayed him, years where she thought she'd always feel in her heart that he betrayed her.

When the truth, she knew, was that they'd betrayed each other – and how does anyone ever come back from that? From that awful truth that says _you chose something else over me_?

But, they _had_. They had come back from that place, and it hadn't been easy. They'd clawed and fought their way back from the edge of a cliff neither of them wanted to go over – from the abyss of anger and blame and hurt so raw it could bleed anew years into the future. And now things felt _normal_ between them – normal, that is, if she ignored the sexual tension that was always near a fever pitch when she was alone with him.

But _that_ had always been their normal – this charge, spark, had always surged between them, even when they were at their worst. Sometimes, especially then.

When they were at their last days as lovers, only their bodies could talk to each other – could whisper apologies with skin on skin where the secrets and lies between them didn't matter anymore. In those last days, nothing else could touch them except _each other_ because nothing else mattered except their hands and mouths and the shameless ecstasy they always found when they were together like that.

So the way Deacon makes her blood sing through her veins even now is nothing new – it's old hat, and she does with it what she does with most things in her life these days: compartmentalizes it. Pretends it doesn't exist or redirects it somewhere else, which might be why her career is flourishing so much despite having a toddler at home in addition to a six-year-old who thinks she's too big for her britches half the time.

Maddie's tiny hand in hers, Rayna raises her fist to knock but the door pulls open before she connects.

"Hey," Deacon says, smiling at her as his eyes rake quickly and, she notices, appreciatively over her body, "Hot outside?"

His gaze is on her chest and she glances down, noticing where the fabric has stuck to her skin and she pulls it away, fanning herself with the material before she arches a brow at him, "As hell."

His eyes connect with hers and she can feel every cell in her body alight with the intensity of his gaze, "Looks like heaven to me," he stares at her for just a beat longer wearing that same teasing grin she'd come to love so well on him before crouching down to Maddie's level, "Hey, Little Maddie! Are you ready to learn the guitar today?"

Maddie nods and squeals in excitement and Deacon laughs, standing up and pulling the door wider so they can pass through. It takes her a moment to slake off the lust he always sends coursing through her body when he teases her like that, but she finally recovers and moves forward, trailing behind Maddie.

"Thanks for doing this," Rayna says as she steps inside his house and tries not to revel in the fact that she's enveloped in _him_ in this space.

"My pleasure," Deacon closes the door behind him and turns to look at Rayna, still smiling, and she pretends not to feel the spark that shoots down her spine.

His eyes are clear and bright, the blue not the least bit faded or hollow as he stares at her and she is struck by an overwhelming need to reach out and touch his cheek. To confirm that this is real – that _he_ is real. Her fingers itch with the urge, but she balls her hand into a fist at her side instead and also resists the urge to drop to her knees and thank every god she's ever heard of that he can look at her like that again – bright-eyed and beautiful: sober.

She'd been scared for so many years that she'd never see him like that again, and then when she had, she'd felt the near-constant fear that it would go away – that he'd drown it in a bottle again, and the boy she once knew – the one who taught her how to love and lust – would be lost, but forever this time. She's only just started trusting it, trusting that it won't go away to a whim, to a bad day, to a memory, and she can't help but feel how much she'd missed _this_ version of him.

And if she can't have him all the ways she wants him, she will take him like this – _god_ , she will take him like this.

Deacon leads them into the living room where a guitar case sits with a big pink bow on top of it. It takes Maddie all of two seconds to notice it and she runs over to the couch, her tiny fingers reverently touching the edge of the guitar case.

"Is it for me?" The awe in her voice tugs at Rayna's heart and she can feel the tears welling in her eyes as she watches her daughter move to trace the bow.

Deacon nods and walks over to the couch, unlatching the guitar case and pulling out the instrument, "It sure is, sweetie." Holding the guitar in one hand, he picks Maddie up with careful ease and sets her gently down on the couch before he places the guitar face-up in her lap, "Lord knows we couldn't have your _Momma_ picking out this guitar."

"Hey!" Rayna protests, but she's smiling as she steps into the living room and leans on the arm of the couch, "I can pick 'em just fine."

"Oh," Deacon nods as he closes the guitar case and sets it off to the side, "That's right. It was just the playin' 'em that always tripped you up," he grins at her, shooting her a wink before he drops down to his knees in front of Maddie.

Maddie, oblivious, runs her hands over the six strings, a huge grin on her face, "Thank you!" She exclaims, then moves to pluck each string one by one, "Thank you, Uncle Deacon!"

Deacon reaches out to ruffle Maddie's hair before he props the guitar up in her lap and sits down on the coffee table in front of her and Rayna's heart stutters in her chest at the sight – at the _words_ 'Uncle Deacon.'

And suddenly, that elephant is in the room again – the one Deacon doesn't even know exists, and she feels the weight of it surrounding her. Because no matter how much better things have gotten, there is always _this_ between them. There will _always_ be this between them. This unspoken thing that makes her feel sick to her stomach because none of them deserve this.

Deacon doesn't deserve it, Rayna doesn't deserve it, and Maddie damn sure doesn't deserve it, but it's all there is now – this secret, this elephant, this unbearable thing between all of them that _he can never know_.

Deacon flips the guitar upright in Maddie's lap and positions her tiny fingers on the fretboard; her hand can't wrap around the whole thing but she looks so fascinated and intent as he guides her hand with a pick grasped tightly between her small thumb and forefinger, over the strings.

Despite being perfectly in-tune, it makes a terrible noise, but Maddie grins and kicks her legs out, and does it again this time without Deacon's help.

"Good job!" Deacon praises her even though it sounds even worse than before, leaning forward as he pulls his hands back and watches her fumble around before turning to Rayna, a playful smirk spreading across his face, "She's better than you already."

An unexpected laugh hisses out of Rayna and she rolls her eyes, "Shut up."

Deacon smiles, "Wonder where she got it."

It's a joke – she can _see_ that it's a joke, because Maddie can barely even hold the guitar, let alone play it. But it drags something up in her, a latent sense of longing for the truth that is always there inside of her, but sometimes closer to the surface than others.

And as Deacon turns his attention back to Maddie, focusing on getting her comfortable with just holding a guitar that's nearly as big as she is, Rayna feels the longing pulling the words up her throat – _from you, Deacon_ – but before they can float into the air between them and change _everything_ about all of their lives, she swallows them back down because she can't risk it.

Rayna can't risk her relationship with her daughter, yes, but Maddie's young enough that she would probably adapt to the news with relative ease. The truth, the unbearable heartbreaking truth is that Rayna also can't risk _him_. She _can't_ see Deacon like that again – he won't survive it, and neither will she.

It makes her the worst kind of coward, she's sure, but she can't lose him again, and when she's honest with herself, she can't envision a world in which this secret she's kept him from – this _daughter_ she's kept him from – doesn't tear him apart from the inside out, the same way it's done to her.

And she loves him too much – even still, even now – to take a chance. So, she lets the secret sit heavy on her heart as she turns to stare at them, seeing all the best parts of both of them in her daughter. In _their_ daughter, and she knows: she will let the secret utterly destroy her before she lets it have a chance to destroy him.

So she holds her tongue, and watches the man that breathed life into her so long ago teach _his daughter_ how to play the guitar.

The lesson lasts only as long as Maddie's attention span, and then she's running around his living room, a bounding ball of energy, and for a moment Rayna sees so clearly the life they could have had together if only he'd been sober, if only she'd tried harder, _if only_ a lot of things.

Deacon must notice the change in her, the melancholy that slides itself under her skin, because he steps forward, his fingertips lightly brushing her elbow, "You okay, Ray?"

And if that just isn't the question of the century: _no, I'm not. I haven't been for six years. Never have been since I watched you destroy that cabin_ again _and every chance at a life as a family we ever had with it_.

But she just smiles and nods, "Yeah," she glances at Maddie, currently spinning in circles in Deacon's living room, her head jutted up towards the ceiling, arms spread out wide as she wobbles, "Sorry about that."

Deacon looks at Maddie where she's spinning and when she falls to the ground with a shriek and a giggle, Deacon just laughs, "Don't have to apologize to me. She's got a lot of energy," he grins as Maddie gets back up, inclining his head, "Just like her Momma."

Rayna tilts her head in silent question.

"Not a single thing could ever keep you down; nothing ever breaks you. You just get right back up." Deacon explains, looking at her with a type of awe she knows she doesn't deserve.

Rayna feels her heart clench in her chest because _he doesn't know_. He wasn't there for the nights she spent crying herself to sleep, for the nights she felt so lonely in another man's arms, in another man's bed – he isn't there for the nights she _still_ does.

Deacon doesn't know that losing _him_ very nearly did break her. He doesn't know that there are times she's not so sure that it didn't, after all, times when she feels like only a hollow shell of herself and whoever she was before she met him, half-asleep.

When she doesn't respond, just searches his eyes for something she shouldn't _want_ to see there and _knowing_ she will find it the same way he would find it in hers if he ever looked, Deacon glances away, running his hand over the back of his neck. "So. Tour next week. I know we've been rehearsing a lot lately, but you ready?"

He smiles at her, and _this_ she can do – "Oh, I'm always ready." She lets the flirtatiousness seep into her voice because as strange as it is, _that_ feels like safe ground between them after the minefield they've just navigated.

"I do remember that," Deacon says, his voice dropping to the timbre that always made her toes curl no matter what he was saying. She isn't surprised to find that it still works – of course it still works.

Rayna opens her mouth to reply, but Maddie comes barreling at her legs, throwing her arms around them and hugging both of them as tightly as her little arms can manage, "Mama! I'm hungry! I'm sleepy!"

Rayna glances at Deacon and smiles apologetically, "That's our cue," she bends down and picks Maddie up, propping her on one hip, "Thanks again for doing this."

"Sure thing," Deacon says, reaching out and running his hand lightly along Maddie's cheek – Maddie smiles and burrows her head against Rayna's neck, "She's a natural."

Rayna's heart cracks in her chest, because Maddie really, really _is_. Rayna walks to the door, her arms tightening around Maddie before she turns to face Deacon as he opens the door and the hot air rushes in to greet them, "See you at rehearsal tomorrow?"

"I'll be there," Deacon says, but there's a weight to his words, a heaviness to his gaze that makes her stop and stare at him on his porch.

She nods, and he reaches out and tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, his rough fingers brushing the shell of it and she _shivers_ despite the oppressive heat surrounding her.

"I'm not going _anywhere_ , Ray," Deacon whispers, casually leaning against the doorframe, his thumb hooked in the front pocket of his jeans, "Not ever again."

Rayna feels the tears building in her eyes and she blinks them away, dropping her sunglasses over her eyes as she nods again, staring at him for a long moment before she turns and walks back to her car, silence on her tongue because there are so many things she _can't say_.

Things that have haunted her for years, things that will _always_ haunt her: _I'm sorry, she's yours, I love, love, love you – I never stopped, and god help us, I never will._


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Part 3/5: the one time she did._

* * *

The bar is a dive. It's run-down and filthy and sitting on the edge of town, close enough to have regulars, but far enough away that no one without firsthand knowledge really knows to look there to find someone. And even if they do, it doesn't much matter in the end. Everyone's lost, anyway.

It's a bar for secrets; it's a bar for people who have most of their good days behind them. For people who can't see a future that doesn't end in tragedy, for people whose futures already have. It _smells_ like tragedy, like stale air, stale beer, stale dreams – like where sadness comes to breathe, to leave everything behind and in its wake, until it clings to everything you thought was yours.

Rayna _hates_ this bar; hates this firsthand knowledge that she never asked for. Because she does know this bar, and there isn't a day that passes that she wishes she didn't. She knows it far better than she should, though she's never even had a drink here.

As she sits in the parking lot, she white-knuckles the steering wheel, staring up at the neon light – _Bar_ flashing in a pink that used to be red, but only the B and the R are currently working.

But even with the defunct neon, there is no mistaking this place for anything other than what it is: _the end_.

She doesn't want to be here – she wants to be at home, in bed. She wants warm, protective arms wrapped around her and the life that's growing inside of her stomach. She wants to ignore the whisper in her blood that tells her every night the truth she will spend years running from: _these are the wrong arms_ ; _this is the wrong man_.

But the only man she's ever loved found out about that life growing inside of her tonight, and he's here, in this bar, drinking himself into a stupor, aiming for numbness or an early grave, whichever comes first. _Preferably both_ , he'd slurred down the line, his voice a warning sign in her ear, a red flag held high and waving in the thick air that has always existed between them.

 _You don't have to go_ , Teddy had whispered against her neck, but his kiss against her nape didn't soothe, didn't calm– only one kiss had ever done that, only one touch, and it would never belong to the man that put the ring she currently wears on her finger.  
 _Yes_ , she'd whispered, prying his arm from around her swollen belly, _I do_.

Heaving a sigh now, she wiggles her ring off her finger and slides it into the glove compartment of her brand-new SUV before she steps out of the car. The gravel of the parking lot crunches beneath her feet, and she nearly slips on it: an omen.

Steadying herself, she slams the door, trying to quell the dread that creeps up her spine as she walks the all too familiar path to the front door of the bar.

It's heavy, and opens on a groan. It's loud inside, Bluegrass tumbling through the cheap speakers in each corner, and it smells just like she remembers: like sawdust and stale air –and all at once the desperation and sadness hit her, because she shouldn't have to be here.

 _He_ shouldn't have to be here.

 _Nothing is as it should be_ , her blood whispers, crying out in her veins as her hand glances over her stomach.

Eyes turn to see the new arrival as she steps inside, letting the door slam behind her. But no one pays attention to her for too long, everyone too wrapped up in their own sorrow, their own wounds bleeding, to care about hers.

 _The world_ , her Momma's voice comes to her, _always keeps movin', little darlin'. Always._

And so it does, in ways unexpected. In ways brilliant and beautiful and in ways tragic, tragic, tragic – she's learned that the hard way more than once in her lifetime now. There's one man who taught it to her.

It's how she has an engagement ring that might make a better paperweight sitting in her car right now. It's how the man who taught her how to kiss, how to cry, how to bleed emotion – into a relationship, into a perfect song – is sitting at the bar drinking himself stupid while another man is warm in her bed what feels like a thousand miles away from this _Bar_.

Rayna's eyes find Deacon immediately – they always have, and she knows now that they always will. She can feel his presence, like a tangible thing, and she doesn't have to wonder if he can feel hers, too. She knows he can – this _connection_ is fragile sometimes; it's tenuous, like frayed yarn, but she knows somehow that, even if neither of them want it to be, it's indestructible.

She only wishes that _they_ were.

Wishes that they hadn't torn each other up, down, and sideways – left each other broken and scarred. But there's nothing for that, now. There is no salve to fix the wounds, to slather over the burns – they're just lucky they haven't turned each other to ash.

Not yet, anyway.

Deacon's shoulders straighten just a bit, just enough, as he lolls his head to the side, his eyes cutting to her before darting away.

With a determination she doesn't quite feel – because she's _tired_ of hurting, tired of _hurting him_ – she walks towards him, stopping when her boots are mere inches from his barstool.

"How many have you had?"

Deacon turns to eye her, his gaze sliding down her body, lingering on her stomach, and then back up before he cocks his head to the side, "Apparently not enough."

"Your demons riding you hard tonight, Deacon?"

"I ain't got no demons, Ray," he slurs the words as his fingers close around his shot glass, "'cept one."

"Is that right?"

He nods, "s'right," he tips the shot back and slams the empty glass back down on the bar before his eyes flick down to her hands, "About 2 carats, usually sitting on that pretty little finger of yours. You seen it?"

Rayna presses her eyes shut, "No," she shakes her head as she speaks, but it's not an answer to his question. She opens her eyes and stares at him, at his profile as he tries to signal the bartender for another shot, "Your demons are what put it there in the first damn place." It's a low blow, she knows that, even if it _is_ the truth.

Deacon's lip curls up in a sneer, "You could've waited for me," he says the words with anger, but Rayna can hear the hurt laced in the words, knows it as the same strain that pulses through her blood every day she spends without him, "You could have goddamn waited for me."

Her eyes begin to sting and she can feel the tears gathering storm; she hasn't cried over anything _but_ him in so long, she wonders if she has any tears left for anyone – _anything_ – else. She offers him a wry smile and her voice is thin when she speaks, "Waited for what, Deacon?" She looks at him, eyes swimming, "Waited for _this_?"

The bartender finally looks Deacon's way and starts to amble over, bottle of cheap liquor in-hand, but Rayna fixes him with a stare before he even makes it halfway to them, "If you serve him anymore alcohol, I swear to god…"

The threat hangs in the air, and the bartender holds his hands up before stepping away, shaking his head and muttering as he goes.

"Can't a man get drunk in peace?" Deacon asks, his words running together, his gaze glassy as he looks at Rayna.

Rayna scoffs before she leans over the bar, grabs a bottle of water, twists off the cap and hands it to him, "You passed drunk about," she tilts her head, assessing, "three shots ago, I'd say," and it breaks both of their hearts how well she knows him like this.

She's seen him _like this_ only a few times, but she knows exactly what it means – knows he's not going to remember a single thing about this night tomorrow. Everything will run together until nothing is left except a vague picture that will never become clear. Shapes, not specifics.

Deacon takes the water from her hand, but he narrows his eyes at her, "Why don't you just leave, Rayna?" He scoffs, "Leave me. You're _real_ good at that."

The anger sparks bright and hot in Rayna's blood, "You want to talk to me about _leaving_ , Deacon Claybourne?" She leans in close to him, "Oklahoma City, Denver, Albuquerque, Portland, Des Moines, Sarasota," she ticks off each city with a finger, "Couldn't find you anywhere. Had to call in a replacement for my bandleader, which was bad enough – which _hurt_ enough," she shakes her head, "But you were my _boyfriend_ , too, Deacon."

The shame passes behind his eyes before he takes a long pull of the water, but when he looks back at her, it's gone, "Well." He clears his throat, "Looks like you got a replacement now, huh?" He tries to slide off the barstool, but misses, one foot on the ground, one foot clinging to the footrest of the barstool. His laugh is mean, "Traded up too, right?"

She shakes her head, her anger deflating because god, she has _never_ seen it like that, "Don't do this."

Deacon slams the water bottle on the bar, water sloshing over the side. Ice cold droplets hit Rayna's arm, but it's not what causes the goosebumps that rise up over her arm. It's Deacon, the way he's looking at her, wounded and angry – and maybe he _is_ the injured party, but she is, too. She's hurt so much for him, _because_ of him – she still does, can feel it like a buzzing under her skin that she can never seem to eradicate. "Don't do _what_ , Rayna?" He shakes his head, "Tell you that you broke my damn heart? That I damn well can't breathe with you gone?"

"Stop," she whispers, because these are her thoughts mirrored back to her.

His hand moves quicker than she'd have thought for the state he's in, his palm caressing the side of her face before his fingers tangle in her hair, tightly but not cruelly, "I'll never stop, Rayna," he leans forward and Rayna doesn't want to – or maybe it's that she wants it too much – but she nuzzles her face into his palm, his calluses like the sweetest lullaby on her skin, "I'll never stop, baby. Never."

He inches closer to her, and she closes her eyes – finds herself listing forward, her body so familiar with its desires that it doesn't stop to think about anything other than the fact that it's Deacon's hand on her face, Deacon's fingers in her hair. She can feel the memory of Deacon's lips on her own, and there is nothing she wants more in this moment than to feel them again – than to kiss him. But the minute he gets too close, she can smell the alcohol on him, thick and nauseating, and it jars her back to the present.

Makes her painfully aware that the man before her now isn't the boy she fell in love with. The boy she fell in love with is in there somewhere, she knows, and she wants him back – but she won't get him like this, and she knows that the truth is that she might never see him again.

She freezes, pulling back, and she doesn't miss the flash of pain in Deacon's eyes. Her hand moves up to cover his before she pries his fingers out of her hair and sets his hand back on the bar with a gentle squeeze.

He stares at her, his eyes clear for just a moment. His voice bleeds pain, disbelief, "It's really that easy for you isn't it, Rayna?"

"If you think any of this is easy for me – if you think _you've_ been easy on me, Deacon," she shakes her head, "Then you haven't been paying a bit of attention all these years."

His eyes change, a storm brewing, ready to break and he snarls at her when he speaks, "Bullshit," he finally stands from the stool, wobbling only a little. He reaches into his pocket and slaps some bills on the bar before he near-stumbles past Rayna and towards the door.

"Deacon," his name is a plea on her lips, and she feels a bolt of panic course through her body because she can see him digging his keys out of his pocket. "Deacon Claybourne," she unfreezes just as he pushes the door open and walks into the cool night air.

Deacon doesn't look over his shoulder, just walks in the direction of his truck, his keys gripped tightly in his hand.

"You are _not_ driving!" Rayna shouts, but her voice is eaten up by the night. She picks up the pace and runs to catch him, her hand touching his bicep, "Did you hear me? You're _not_ driving!"

He shrugs her off and keeps walking, "I stopped being your responsibility the minute you left me in rehab and let _him_ into your bed."

Panic sits heavy in her chest, because once he gets to the truck, she won't be able to stop him and she can't lose him – not like this, not ever like this. Like all her worst nightmares come true.

"We _belong_ to each other!" She shouts, "We belong to each other, what about that, Deacon? Don't we… Don't we _still_?" It's what they always used to say to each other – they used to whisper it to each other in the dead of night, used to smile at each other and say it when they sat in those nosebleed seats before each and every show, used to cry it out in ecstasy as they made each other come with their mouths, hands, bodies.

The words stop him in his tracks, his hands still squeezing his keys, and she catches up to him. His face is stoic before it switches to rage, "You're about to _belong to someone else_ , Rayna. Y'all set a date yet?"

She shakes her head, speaks the only truth she's ever known, "I don't belong to anyone but _you_ , Deacon. I never have, and…. God, I never will."

Deacon closes his eyes and then opens them, "That baby growing inside of you says something different, Rayna."

He starts walking again, a few feet away from his truck now, and the panic breaks open in Rayna's blood. She has to stop him – whatever else happens, she _has_ to.

She knows he won't remember in the morning, knows this will all be some memory he'll never be able to place, but she tells him what she knows in her heart to be true – what she has wanted to tell him since the day she found out about her daughter.

"This baby, Deacon?" She says it on a sob, on a yell, "This baby _growing inside of me_? _She's yours_."

The words stop Deacon immediately, his keys falling to the ground as he turns around to face her, "What?"

"The baby is _yours_."

He stands still, watching her, his eyes roving over her face, and she lets the truth sit plain on her face. When he sees it, he draws in a sharp breath and moves towards her, "Mine?" he asks, standing in front of her. When she nods, tears in her eyes, he grips her face between his hands, "Mine." He presses a kiss to her forehead and then drops to her knees, her belly right at his eye level. He reaches out and places his hands on her pregnant stomach, looking up at her before closing his eyes and pressing his lips against over the swell.

Deacon's lips are warm through her shirt, his lips reverent as he cries, tears streaming down his face, his mouth kissing every inch of her belly. He whispers ' _mine, mine, mine_ ' between kisses, his knees on the gravel of the parking lot, the broken neon sign in the middle distance.

Rayna threads her fingers through his hair, holding his mouth against her stomach, her own tears tracking a lonely path down her face because she knows.

She knows he won't remember any of this tomorrow – and _she_ will; her heart will ache when she does. She'll have to remember the tenderness of his lips on her belly through her shirt, she'll have to remember the look in his eye, the hope that fluttered in her chest at the sound of his voice muffled by her skin.

She'll have to remember how seeing him like that made her think about the beginning – the beginning of _them_ , and the promise that took root in her heart the very first moment she saw him: the boy who taught her how to kiss, how to come so quietly no one could hear her, how to come so loudly the walls rattled.

She will always remember him like that, she will always think of the beginning and smile through her tears.

But there is no mistaking this place – Deacon on his knees – for anything other than what it is: _the end_.


End file.
